Valentine
by Laurie M
Summary: Babylon Noir. It's February 1949 - and the best laid plans can come undone...


Disclaimer: All of the usual stuff - _Babylon 5_ is owned by J Michael Straczynski, Babylonian Productions™ and Warners™.

Author's Note: written for the Valentine's Day Un-Challenge at the LJ community no_shadows_fall

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**Valentine**

**By**

**Laurie M**

_**To:**__ The General Editor_

_**From:**__ Head of Research_

_This is the only entry that we could find that was seasonally related; it comes from the pen of Mike Garibaldi but is charming nonetheless._

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_New York, 14 February 1949_

'You know Mark sent Susan another cable?'

'Uh-huh.'

'It said, "Be my Valentine. P.S. Will you marry me?" '

'Uh-huh.'

'She sent one back, "No and Go to Hell - pick the order".'

'Uh-huh.'

I blew out a breath and fixed my eyes on the big lug's face. 'Is that all I'm going to get out of you? Uh-huh? Will you quit moping?'

'I'm not moping.'

'There's no need to get sore.'

'I'm not-' John clamped his pearlies together and the tick in his jaw started up. 'I'm not sore.' He was quiet for a minute and then: 'You just had to take this case didn't you?'

'I didn't think it would take this long!'

John was driving and he kept his mitts on the wheel and his eyes on the asphalt, for which I was grateful. 'This wasn't even my choice; I didn't get a say in it. And if you say that our partnership was my idea to begin with, I swear to God I'll slug you right across the choppers.'

I kept my yap shut.

'That's the last time I leave you on your own...'

'Brother, this is not the way I'd have chosen to spend the night either.' His eyes slid sideways and the tick started jumping double-time. 'Yeah, yeah, okay... I didn't do it on purpose.'

He sighed and relaxed his grip on wheel just enough that his knuckles stopped looking white and started looking knuckle-coloured. 'I know; it's just that we had plans...'

I should probably back up some. The deal, in a nutshell, was this: John had gone down to our bank to talk to our bank manager about the state of our finances. He's the one with the expensive suits and the fancy patter so it seemed like a good idea to let him loose on his own down there.

What we hadn't figured on was me being let loose on my own back at the office.

A guy had come in looking for a detective and I'd taken the case, thinking it would be a simple job and it should have been. It had got more complicated - and that's a whole other story in itself - and so here we were.

For some of us it was just a regular old night that happened to have the date of February 14; for others it was the day for giving cards and candy and flowers. I had no doubt that cards had been exchanged in the Sheridan household and I'm sure that John had given Della more flowers to go with the few thousand she had already. That probably would have been fine, except for the fact that Della had been in Boston for a week and in the course of that week John had managed to do a passable impression of a human being but had really been more like a big black bear who's just emerged form his lair after winter. And I'm talking cranky with a capital CRANK. Della had got back that morning and I figured that John had been looking forward to celebrating being reunited with his main squeeze. Okay, so she was his only squeeze, which may have been his problem.

The upshot was that what with our case and all (that I had taken without John's say so, in case you'd forgotten) we were working that night. One of us would be manning the docks on a stakeout while the other would be manning the phones. I'd volunteered to do the docks. I try to make it a point of principle never to volunteer for anything, but I felt a bit of a louse given the circumstances so I figured that the least I could do was take the short end of the bargain. John being the generous soul that he is let me take it; he'd be back in the office - instead of taking Della to the Waldorf to see Xavier Cugat like he'd been planning.

The car rolled to a halt outside the building that housed our office; I looked up at it and tried to work out how many months we had left before it finally got that overdue condemned notice on it.

The inside wasn't much better; in fact, I think that it was actually warmer outside than it was inside. I clapped my hands together and kept rubbing them all the while we rode up in the elevator car until it lurched to a halt on our floor. When we opened the door to the office, John took a step inside and then stiffened. I saw his shoulders brace.

'I thought Susan had gone home.'

The outer office was dark but there was light through the glass panel in the door to the inner office - the one I shared with John. We crossed the floor, John ahead of me, and he stepped lightly with that smooth, quiet walk that he learnt somewhere that he doesn't like to talk about. He got his hand on the door-handle, turned it softly and then threw the door open.

It's impressive what a doll can do with a desk-lamp and a couple of candles. Flickering light and soft music from a portable gramophone poured out to greet us. My desk faces the door head on and Della was leaning against it, swaying slightly in time to the music.

'What...'

I could only see the back of John's head but I figured that he was gawking at her. Over his shoulder I could see that she was smiling and her eyes had that soft dewy look that they get when she's around him.

'You have a new partner for the night,' she told him. 'How do you fancy starting with dinner from Twenty-One?'

He was still gawking at her - for a bright guy he can be a real dope. I put my hand between his shoulder blades and pushed him through the door. 'Didn't they teach you not to keep a lady waiting?'

John looked back over his shoulder at me. 'You-'

Della laughed: she has a nice laugh, the soft, supple sort that winds it way around you; she gave me one of her smiles. 'Thanks, Mike.'

'No problem.'

'Where are you headed?' John had finally rediscovered the powers of speech.

'The docks - some of us are still working.'

'There's a hamper for you - Drahl cooked up some of that pheasant that you like.'

Sure enough, there was a basket for me just inside the door.

'Thanks. I'll see you kids tomorrow.'

I don't think they heard me; as I was closing the door John put his hands on Della's waist and her arms went around his neck. I closed the door.

I walked down the corridor, back to the elevator, whistling and swinging my basket. Okay, so there wasn't dinner from a fancy restaurant for me, and there was no champagne on ice and no candles stuck on saucers and no Cugi on the gramophone, but I wasn't complaining.

_The End_


End file.
